My wife did an awesome experiment and piece of analysis with the heating system at home last week. She ran the heating system all day - 7.30am to 8pm one day. The next day, she ran it for two short slots - 6.15am to 7.30am and then 4.30pm to 8pm.
Converting data into kWh, the all day use was 174kWh which cost £6.52.
The two shorter slots used 83.8kWh which cost £3.14.
So that suggests using shorter slots because it costs half the price.
But when you work out the cost per hour, running all day was 52p per hour but the two shorter slots were 66p per hour.
We need better insulation if we want the "keep it on all day" approach to reap benefits. The problem is clearly that the house cools down considerably between the two slots and then has to be reheated.
